PSX won't read discs

Post by **yari** » March 3rd, 2019, 3:44 am

Hello, I have had a problem for the last 3 months with my SCPH-9002. It spins for a while but then it goes straight to the menu. I can see a red dot when I press the door tray sensor. I tried these things so far to no avail:
1. Swapping laser with a new one (both are KSM-AEM)
2. Tweaking pot on both lasers (though lowering resistance made the red dot stronger and disc spinned faster)
3. Turning it upside down (it's noisier, but something pops in there after it stop turning, it could be laser hitting the disc)
4. Changing IC702, except I swapped it with an incompatible one so the old motherboard is dead as I can't find a new part (AN8732SB)
5. Changing the whole motherboard (PU23, I ordered it from FullyRetro, no modchip was installed on the board)
No matter what I try, it won't work. One thing I noticed is that the disc is kinda wobbly when it spins, but it's on both lasers. Any help is absolutely welcome.

Post by **[C]oopeZz** » March 4th, 2019, 6:10 am

Shot in dark but try to plug your console somewhere else. Sounds weird but this fixed my problem with "Red ring of dead" on Xbox 360.

Post by **TriMesh** » March 4th, 2019, 12:47 pm

Honestly, my guess is that you have two bad optical pickup assemblies, not least because they are by far the highest failure rate item on these consoles. I would recommend finding someone local that has a working SCPH-9002 (and doesn't mind you taking it apart!) and swapping the parts you have (PSU, mainboard, optical pickup assemblies) into it one at a time and see if it works with them.

One other thing is that if you adjusted the LD power pot to the end stop while the laser was running, it's quite possible that you permanently damaged the laser diode - the glow is not a very useful diagnostic here, since a damaged laser diode will often still emit light, just not the coherent light you need to perform readback on an optical disc.